


everybody needs a prayer and needs a friend

by jynersq



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-02
Updated: 2014-11-02
Packaged: 2018-02-23 14:15:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2550557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jynersq/pseuds/jynersq
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With impossible care, May draws her in close, wrapping her arms across thin shoulders. Jemma’s stiff, for a moment, surprised. And then her whole being droops, as though all the negligible strength she has left has been sapped away.</p>
<p>She buries her face in May’s neck and cries.</p>
<p>(Or, Jemma tries to hide herself away after talking to Mack, and May finds her.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	everybody needs a prayer and needs a friend

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Juliana (owlvsdove) for beta-ing! Also, for being official Queen Of All Things MaySimmons.

Jemma turns on her heel and leaves Mack in her dust.  
  
She leaves him to the former lab, heart sitting sick and heavy in her throat, thumping in her ears. Stomach turning his words around inside her, pulling them apart, already swallowed, already digesting.  
  
 _The only thing I’ve seen make him worse... is you._  
  
On the most unbiased cognitive level, she knows what he says is true — but hearing it aloud, in another voice, is terrible, unwanted confirmation. All this time, she’d managed to hold out some semblance of hope, even in HYDRA’s labs, even in the unfamiliar apartment, that she’d done the right thing. That leaving Fitz, as brutal as it had been, would allow her to someday return and function alongside him in a way that she prevented before, with her presence.  
  
All this time, she’d been wrong. _Stupid._  
  
Swiping at her eyes, she makes her way past a few unfamiliar faces, head down. She stumbles blindly into the first anonymous hallway she finds, moving purposefully farther and farther from the sounds of other clamoring voices. Until all walls and doorways are the same, and she’s alone.  
  
She lowers herself beside the wall with as much dignity as she can muster, small hands shaking where she holds herself together at the elbows. Dust from the hall settles thickly in her nose, and she buries her head in her arms.  
  
—  
  
Melinda May finds her like this:  
  
Curled around herself in the dim light of one of the more dank, less-frequented hallways, head pillowed on her knees. May quickly identifies the short brown hair, thin shoulders. Loose-fitting blouse that only does so much to disguise the angles of her shoulders and elbows, sharper than she remembers. Jemma doesn’t make a sound, nor does she indicate an awareness of May's approach, her shoulders trembling with fragile heartbreak.  
  
Very slowly, May lowers herself to a crouch at her level.  
  
A moment later, Jemma raises her head, and one look at the delicate under-eye redness sloughs off all other concerns.  
  
With impossible care, May draws her in close, wrapping her arms across thin shoulders. Jemma’s stiff, for a moment, surprised. And then her whole being droops, as though all the negligible strength she has left has been sapped away.  
  
She buries her face in May’s neck and cries.

\--  
  
It doesn’t take long. By the time May’s legs are beginning to cramp from the crouch, Jemma’s breathing incrementally easier, and she can shift to sit beside her, against the wall. She doesn’t have to ask what all this is about — though she has her own suspicions — because Jemma has already begun to tell her.  
  
"I’m not making him any better, I’m afraid," is the first thing she says. Shakily, and wiping at her eyes. There's no need to clarify _whom_ any further. Her knees are curled up to her chest, hair tear-stuck to her face.  
  
"I thought I was doing right by him, by leaving. I— I could see how hard it was for him, to recover, to try to immediately do everything he could before, and not be able to, and I thought. I thought, by leaving, I could give him the space he needed.” She lets out a long, slow breath, rustling her short hair. “But it seems, no matter what I do, I'm wrong.”  
  
Beside her, May closes her eyes to pull her thoughts together. She goes so so long without answering, in fact, that if Jemma didn’t know her better, she’d wonder if she’d fallen asleep.  
  
Finally, May takes in a soft sigh. Reopens her eyes. And then she speaks.  
  
"We can’t always protect the people we love," she says, quietly.  
  
Jemma goes very still.  
  
"In our business, more than most," May continues. Every syllable is deliberate, measured. "Sometimes—" She pauses, thinking not only of Fitz, but her own partner, the one upstairs, with small scratches in his desk and larger ones in his mind. "Sometimes there is no best choice, or even right one. Only the least terrible thing.”  
  
Jemma sighs out a shaky little breath, kneading her nervous hands together.  
  
"I don’t know what to do," she says, very small. "I only make him worse when I’m here. But I don’t know where else to go."  
  
May turns to look her in the eyes. “Jemma, no one would ask you to leave again. No one wants you to leave.” _Especially not Fitz,_ she doesn’t say, not wanting to prod an already sufficiently bruised area.  
  
"He doesn’t want me here," she says, resignedly. Rests her head on her open hands. "I only make him worse."  
  
"Did he say that?" May asks, perfectly mild.  
  
Jemma hesitates. “Well, no-- I mean, not directly, but—”  
  
May holds up a hand, stops her in her tracks. “Don’t assume. Just ask.”  
  
Jemma opens her mouth to respond, but is abruptly cut off as May’s walkie-talkie crackles to life on her belt. Coulson's voice, noticeably tense, patches through.  
  
"May, I need to see you in the conference room as soon as possible."  
  
She ignores it.  
  
"Shouldn't you--" Jemma begins, hesitantly.  
  
"I'm not done here," May replies, calmly, though she does begin to untangle herself from her seated position. Her back and knees ache, just a little, from resting on the hard concrete floor.  
  
"I know you want to help Fitz," she continues. "We all do. Right now, the best you can do is be there for him."

"I-- But I'm not sure I know  _how,"_ Jemma says, calmer now than she was, but still faintly distressed. "I thought I did, but what if I--"

"Talk to him," May emphasizes, talking a bit louder over more static from the walkie-talkie, "Find out. But _don't_ put words in his mouth. And _don't_ let him put words in yours."  
  
"May? Do you copy?" comes Coulson's voice at her side.  
  
"I'm in the middle of something, Phil," she says, sharply. He goes quiet. Then, with less edge, "I'm coming."

To Jemma:

"Sometimes we think we know what other people need. How they feel. But the  _only_ way to be sure," she stresses, "is to  _ask_ them. Make sense?"

"I-- Yes." Jemma bites at the edge of her bottom lip, considering. "All right."

"You don't have to go right back to him today. You're allowed to make decisions to protect yourself, too, you know," she says. "But if you want to know? You two  _have_ to talk."  
  
When she stands, Jemma stands, too.

"All right if I go?" she asks, eyeing Jemma thoroughly, like she could see right into her. Maybe she can.  
  
Jemma nods, crossing her arms over her chest against the chill of the hall, to lend herself some strength.  
  
Before she turns to go, May reaches over and tips her chin up with two fingers, looks her directly in the eyes.  
  
"You can do this," she says. "You are going to be okay. If I know Fitz half as well as you do -- he just wants to talk to you."  
  
Jemma nods once more. Blinks, hard, to keep her eyes from welling up again. Satisfied, May turns to go.

"If you need me," she calls over her shoulder, walking away, "just call."

"Thank you," Jemma answers back, unable to quite convert the fervent depth of her gratefulness. She rubs a thumb absently over her elbow, and begins to collect herself, to plan, to pull her thoughts back into organization.

May leaves her to her thoughts. Gives her privacy now to wipe her eyes, to find her way back down the maze of halls when she's ready. And she knows she will. Admittedly, she might not adequately express it enough, but the strength of the young women of her team consistently amazes and astounds her.

Brave kid like that? She'll be just fine.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! As always, commentary and constructive criticism are very much appreciated, if you can spare the time. ♥


End file.
